The Priest, the Woman and the Confessional

By CHARLES CHINIQUY

A former priest
warns of the dangers of the confessional

CHAPTER 9

The
Dogma of Auricular Confession -- a Sacriligious
Imposture

BOTH Roman Catholics and
Protestants have fallen into very strange errors in reference to the words
of Christ: "Whosesoever
sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whosesoever sins ye
retain, they are retained." (St. John xx. 23.)

The first have seen in this text the inalienable
attributes of God of forgiving and retaining sins transferred to sinful men;
the second have most unwisely granted their position, even while attempting
to refute their errors.

A little more attention to the translation of
the 3d and 6th verses of chapter xiii. of Leviticus by the Septuagint would
have prevented the former from falling into their sacrilegious errors, and
would have saved the latter from wasting so much time in refuting errors
which refute themselves.

Many believe that the Septuagint Bible was the
Bible that was generally read and used by Jesus Christ and the Hebrew people
in our Saviour's days. Its language was possibly the one spoken at times
by Christ and understood by his hearers. When addressing his apostles and
disciples on their duties towards the spiritual lepers to whom they were
to preach the ways of salvation, Christ constantly followed the very expression
of the Septuagint. It was the foundation of his doctrine and the testimonial
of his divine mission to which he constantly appealed: the book which was
the greatest treasure of the nation.

From the beginning to the
end of the Old and the New Testaments, the bodily leprosy, with which the
Jewish priest had to deal,
is presented as the figure of the spiritual leprosy, sin, the penalty of
which our Saviour had taken upon himself, that we might be saved by his death.
That spiritual leprosy was the very thing for the cleansing of which he had
come to this world -- for which he lived, suffered, and died. Yes, the bodily
leprosy with which the priests of the Jews had to deal, was the figure of
the sins which Christ was to take away by shedding his blood, and with which
his disciples were to deal till the end of the world.

When speaking of the duties
of the Hebrew priests towards the leper, our modern translations say: (Lev.
xiii. v. 6,) "They
will pronounce him clean." or (v. 3) "They will pronounce him unclean."

But this action of the
priests was expressed in a very different way by the Septuagint Bible, used
by Christ and the people
of his time. Instead of saying, "The priest shall pronounce the leper clean," as
we read in our Bible, the Septuagint version says, "The priest shall clean
(katharei), or shall unclean (mianei) the leper."

No one had ever been so foolish, among the Jews,
as to believe that because their Bible said clean (katharei),
their priests had the miraculous and supernatural power of taking away and
curing the leprosy: and we nowhere see that the Jewish priests ever had the
audacity to try to persuade the people that they had ever received any supernatural
and divine power to "cleanse" the leprosy, because their God, through the
Bible, had said of them: "They will cleanse the leper." Both priest and people
were sufficiently intelligent and honest to understand and acknowledge that,
by that expression, it was only meant that the priest had the legal right
to see if the leprosy was gone or not, they had only to look at certain marks
indicated by God himself, through Moses, to know whether or not God had cured
the leper before he presented himself to his priest. The leper, cured by
the mercy and power of God alone, before presenting himself to the priest,
was only declared to be clean by that priest. Thus the priest was said, by
the Bible, to "clean" the leper, or the leprosy; -- and in the opposite case
to "unclean." (Septuagint, Leviticus xiii. v. 3, 6.)

Now, let us put what God has said, through Moses,
to the priests of the old law, in reference to the bodily leprosy, face to
face with what God has said, through his Son Jesus, to his apostles and his
whole church, in reference to the spiritual leprosy from which Christ has
delivered us on the cross.

Septuagint Bible, Levit. xiii.

"And the Priest shall look
on the plague, in the skin of the flesh, and when the hair in the plague
is turned white, and the
plague in sight be deeper than the skin of his flesh, it is a plague of leprosy;
and the priest shall look on him and UNCLEAN HIM (mianei)

"And the Priest shall look
on him again the seventh day, and if the plague is somewhat dark and does
not spread on the skin,
the Priest shall CLEAN HIM (katharei): and he shall wash his clothes
and BE CLEAN" (katharos).

The analogy of the diseases with which the Hebrew
priests and the disciples of Christ had to deal, is striking: so the analogy
of the expressions prescribing their respective duties is also striking.

When God said to the priests
of the Old Law, "You
shall clean the leper," and he shall be "cleaned," or "you shall unclean
the leper," and he shall be "uncleaned," he only gave the legal power to
see if there were any signs or indications by which they could say that God
had cured the leper before he presented himself to the priest. So, when Christ
said to his apostles and his whole church, "Whosesover sins ye shall forgive,
shall be forgiven unto them," he only gave them the authority to say when
the spiritual lepers, the sinners, had reconciled themselves to God, and
received their pardon from him and him alone, previous to the coming to the
apostles.

It is true that the priests of the Old Law had
regulations from God, through Moses, which they had to follow, by which they
could see and say whether or not the leprosy was gone.

If the plague spread not
on the skin. . . . . the priest shall clean him. . . . . but if the priest
see that the scab spread
on the skin, it is leprosy: he shall "unclean" him. (Septuagint, Levit. xiii.
3, 6.)

Should any be convinced
that Christ spoke the Hebrew of that day and not the Greek, and used the
Old Testament in Hebrew,
we have only to say that the Hebrew is precisely the same as the Greek -- the
priest is said to clean or unclean as the case may be, precisely
as in the Septuagint.

So Christ had given to his apostles and his whole
church equally, infallible rules and marks to determine whether or not the
spiritual leprosy was gone, that they might clean the leper and tell him,

I clean thee, I forgive thy sins,

or

I unclean thee I retain thy sins.

I would have, indeed, many passages of the Old
and New Testaments to copy, were it my intention to reproduce all the marks
given by God himself, through his prophets, or by Christ and apostles, that
his ambassadors might know when they should say to the sinner that he was
delivered from his iniquities. I will give only a few.

First: "And he said unto
them, go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature:

"He that believeth and
is baptised, shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall be damned. (Mark
xvi. 15, 16.)

What a strange want of
memory in the Saviour of the World! He has entirely forgotten that "auricular confession," besides
faith and baptism are necessary to be saved! To those who believe and are
baptised, the apostles and the church are authorized by Christ to say:

"You are saved! your sins
are forgiven: I clean you!"

Second: "And when ye come
into a house, salute it.

"And if the house be worthy,
let your peace come upon it: but if it be not worthy, let your peace return
to you.

"And whosoever shall not
receive you nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city,
shake off the dust
of your feet.

"Verily, verily I say unto you, it shall be more
tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah, in the day of Judgment, than
for that city." (Matt. X. 12-15.)

Here, again, the Great Physician tells his disciples
when the leprosy will be gone, the sins forgiven, the sinner purified. It
is when the lepers, the sinners, will have welcomed his messengers, heard
and received their message. Not a word about auricular confession: this great
panacea of the Pope was evidently ignored by Christ.

Third: "If ye forgive men their trespasses, your
heavenly father will also forgive you, -- but if ye forgive not men their trespasses,
neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. "(Matt. vi. 14,15.)

Was it possible to give
a more striking and simple rule to the apostles and the disciples that they
might know when they could
say to a sinner: "Thy sins are forgiven!" or, "thy sins are retained?" Here
the double keys of heaven are most solemnly and publicly given to every child
of Adam! As sure as there is a God in heaven and that Jesus died to save
sinners, so it is sure that if one forgives the trespasses of his neighbor
for the dear Saviour's sake, believing in him, his own sins have been forgiven!
To the end of the world, then, let the disciples of Christ say to the sinner, "Thy
sins are forgiven," not because you have confessed your sins to me, but for
Christ's sake; the evidence of which is that you have forgiven those who
had offended you.

Fourth: "And behold, a
certain one stood up and tempted him, saying: Master, what shall I do to
inherit eternal life?

"He said unto him: What
is written in the law? how readest thou?

"And he, answering, said:
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul,
and with all thy
strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself.

What a fine opportunity
for the Saviour to speak of "auricular confession" as a means given by him
to be saved! But here again Christ forgets that marvellous medicine of the
Popes. Jesus, speaking absolutely
like the Protestants, bids his messengers to proclaim pardon, forgiveness
of sins, not to those who confess their sins to a man, but to those who love
God and their neighbor. And so will his true disciples and messengers do
to the end of the world!

Fifth: "And when he (the
prodigal son) came to himself, he said: I will arise and go to my father,
and I will say unto him,
Father, I have sinned against Heaven and before thee: and I am not worthy
to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.

"And be arose and came
to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him and
had compassion, and ran,
and he fell on his neck and kissed him.

"And the son said, Father,
I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight, and am not worthy to be called
thy son.

"But the father said to his servants: Bring forth
the best robe, and put it on him: put a ring on his hand and shoes on his
feet, and bring hither the fatted calf. For this my son was dead, and he
is alive again, he was lost and he is found." (Luke xv. 17-24.)

Apostles and disciples
of Christ, wherever you will hear, on this land of sin and misery, the cry
of the Prodigal Son: "I
will arise and go to my Father," every time you see him, not at your feet,
but at the feet of his true Father, crying, "Father, I have sinned against
thee," unite your hymns of joy to the joyful songs of the angels of God;
repeat into the ears of that redeemed sinner the sentence just fallen from
the lips of the Lamb, whose blood cleanses us from all our sins; say to him, "Thy
sins are forgiven."

Sixth: "Come unto me all ye who labor, and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of
me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls;
for my yoke is easy and my burden is light." (Matt. xi. 28-30.)

Though these words were
pronounced more than 1800 years ago, they were pronounced this very morning:
they come at every hour
of day and night from the lips and the heart of Christ to everyone of us
sinners. It is just now that Jesus says to every sinner, " Come to me and
I will give ye rest." Christ has never said and he will never say to any
sinner, "Go to my priests and they will give you rest." But he has said, "Come
to me, and I will give you rest."

Let the apostles and disciples
of the Saviour, then, proclaim peace, pardon, and rest, not to the sinners
who come to confess
to them all their sins, but to those who go to Christ, and him alone, for
peace, pardon and rest. For "Come to me," from Jesus' lips, has never meant -- it
will never mean -- "Go and confess to the priests."

Christ would never have
said: "My yoke is easy
and my burden light " if he had instituted auricular confession. For the
world has never seen a yoke so heavy, humiliating, and degrading, as auricular
confession.

Seventh: "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the
wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have eternal life." (John iii. 14.)

Did Almighty God require
any auricular confession in the wilderness, from the sinners, when he ordered
Moses to lift up the
serpent? No! Neither did Christ speak of auricular confession as a condition
of salvation to those who look to Him when He dies on the Cross to pay their
debts. A free pardon was offered to the Israelites who looked to the uplifted
serpent. A free pardon is offered by Christ crucified to all those who look
to Him with faith, repentance, and love. To such sinners the ministers of
Christ, to the end of the world, are authorized to say: "Your sins are forgiven "we
clean your leprosy."

Eighth: "For God so loved
the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in
Him should not perish,
but have eternal life.

"For God sent not his Son
to condemn the world, but that the world, through him, might be saved.

"He that believeth in him
is not condemned; but he that believeth not is condemned already, because
he hath not believed
in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

"And this is the condemnation,
that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light,
because their deeds
were evil. For every one that doeth evil, hateth the light, neither cometh
to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.

"But he that doeth truth, cometh to the light,
that his deeds may be manifest, that they are wrought in God." (John iii.
16-21.)

In the religion of Rome,
it is only through auricular confession that the sinner can be reconciled
to God; it is only after he
has beard a most detailed confession of all the thoughts, desires, and actions
of the guilty one that he can tell him: "Thy sins are forgiven." But in the
religion of the Gospel, the reconciliation of the sinner with his God is
absolutely and entirely the work of Christ. That marvellous forgiveness is
a free gift offered not for any outward act of the sinner: nothing is required
from him but faith, repentance, and love. These are marks by which the leprosy
is known to be cured and the sins forgiven. To all those who have these marks,
the ambassadors of Christ are authorized to say, Your sins are forgiven," we
clean" you.

Ninth: The publican, standing
afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven, but smote upon
his breast, saying: " God!
be merciful to me a sinner!

"I tell you, this man went down to his house justified." (Lake
xviii. 13-14.) Yes! justified! and without auricular confession!

Ministers and disciples
of Christ, when you see the repenting sinner smiting his breast and crying: "Oh, God, have mercy
upon me, a sinner!" shut your ears to the deceptive words of Rome, or its
ugly tail the Ritualists, who tell you to force that redeemed sinner to make
to you a special confession of all his sins to get his pardon. But go to
him and deliver the message of love, peace, and mercy, which you received
from Christ: "Thy sins are forgiven! I 'clean' thee!"

Tenth: "And one of the
malefactors which were hanged, railed on him, saying: If thou be Christ save
thyself and us.

Yes, in the Paradise or Kingdom of Christ, without
auricular confession! From Calvary, when his hands are nailed to the cross,
and his blood is poured out, Christ protests against the great imposture
of auricular confession. Jesus will be, to the end of the world, what he
was, there, on the cross: the sinner's friend; always ready to hear and pardon
those who invoke his name and trust in him.

Disciples of the gospel, wherever you hear the
cry of the repenting sinner to the crucified Saviour:

"Remember me when thou comest to thy Kingdom," go
and give the assurance to that penitent and redeemed child of Adam, that "his
sins are forgiven:" -- "clean the leper."

Eleventh: "Let the wicked forsake his ways, and
the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return to the Lord, and he
will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." (Isa.
lv. 7, 8.)

"Wash you and make you
clean, put away the evils of your doings from before mine eyes: cease to
do evil, learn to do well;
seek judgment, relieve the oppressed; judge the fatherless, and plead for
the widow.

"Come now, and let us reason together, saith the
Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they will be as white as snow; though
they be red like crimson; they shall be as wool." (Isa. i, 16-18.)

Here are the landmarks of the mercy of God, put
by his own Almighty hands! Who will dare to remove them in order to put others
in their place? Has ever Christ touched these landmarks? Has he ever intimated
that anything but faith, repentance, and love, with their blessed fruits,
were required from the sinned to secure his pardon? No-never.

Have the prophets of the
Old Testament or the apostles of the New, ever said a word about "auricular confession," as a
condition for pardon? No -- never.

What does David say? "I confess my sins unto thee,
and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgression
unto the Lord, and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin." (Psalm xxxii.
5.)

What does the apostle John
say? "If we say that
we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the
truth.

"But if we walk in the
light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the
blood of Jesus Christ,
his son, cleanseth us from sin;

"If we say we have no sin,
we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just
to forgive our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." (1 John
i. 6-9.)

This is the language of the prophets and apostles.
This is the language of the Old and the New Testament. It is to God and him
alone that the sinner is requested to confess his sins. It is from God and
him alone that he can expect his pardon.

The apostle Paul writes
fifteen epistles, in which he speaks of all the duties imposed upon human
conscience by the laws of
God and the prescriptions of the Gospel of Christ. A thousand times he speaks
to sinners, and tells them how they may be reconciled to God. But does he
say a word about auricular confession? No -- not one!

The apostles Peter, John, Jude, address six letters
to the different churches, in which they state, with the greatest detail,
what the different classes of sinners have to do to be saved. But again,
not a single word comes from them about auricular confession.

St. James says: "Confess your faults one to another." But
this is so evidently the repetition of what the Saviour had said about the
way of reconciliation between those who had offended one another, and it
is so far from the dogma of a secret confession to the priest that the most
zealous supporters of auricular confession have not dared to mention that
text in favor of their modern invention.

But if we look in vain in the Old and New Testaments
for a word in favor of auricular confession as a dogma, will it be possible
to find that dogma in the records of the first thousand years of Christianity?
No! for the more one studies the records of the Christian Church during those
first ten centuries, the more he will be convinced that auricular confession
is a miserable imposture of the darkest days of the world and the church
this century, by one of the early fathers of the church. But not a word is
said in it of his confessing his sins to anyone, though a thousand things
are said of him which are of a far less interesting character.*

* [This version lacks some
words. -- Ed. Another
version adds the following: And so is it with the lives of several of the
early fathers of the church. Not a word is said of their confessing their
sins to anyone, though a thousand things are said of him which are of a far
less interesting character. -- Ed.]

So it is with the life of St. Mary, the Egyptian.
The minute history of her life, her public scandals, her conversion, long
prayers and fastings in solitude, the detailed history of her last days and
of her death, all these we have; but not a single word is said of her confessing
to anyone. It is evident that she lived and died without ever having thought
of going to confess.

The deacon Pontius wrote also the life of St.
Cyprian, who lived in the third century; but he does not say a word of his
ever having gone to confession, or having heard the confession of anyone.
More than that, we learn from this reliable historian that Cyprian was excommunicated
by the Pope of Rome, called Stephen, and that he died without having ever
asked from anyone absolution from that excommunication; a thing which has
not seemingly prevented him from going to Heaven, since the infallible Popes
of Rome, who succeeded Stephen, have assured us that be is a saint.

Gregory of Nyssa has given us the life of St.
Gregory, of Neo-Caesarea, of the third century, and of St. Basil, of the
fourth century. But neither speak of their having gone to confess, or having
heard the secret and auricular confession of anyone. It is thus evident that
those two great and good men, with all the Christians of their times, lived
and died without ever knowing anything about the dogma of auricular confession.

We have the interesting life of St. Ambrose, of
the fourth century, by Paulinus; and from that book it is evident, as two
and two make four, that St. Ambrose never went to confess.

The history of St. Martin, of Tours, of the fourth
century, by Severus Sulpicius, of the fifth century, is another monument
left by antiquity to prove that there was no dogma of auricular confession
in those days; for St. Martin has evidently lived and died without ever going
to confess.

Pallas and Theoderet have left us the history
of the life, sufferings, and death of St. Cbrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople,
who died at the beginning of the fifth century, and both are absolutely mute
about that dogma. No fact is more evident, by what they say, than that holy
and eloquent bishop lived and died also without ever thinking of going to
confess.

No man has ever more perfectly
entered into the details of a Christian life, when writing on that subject,
than the learned
and eloquent St. Jerome, of the fifth century. Many of his admirable letters
are written to the priests of his day, and to several Christian ladies and
virgins, who had requested him to give them some good advice about the best
way to lead a Christian life. His letters, which form five volumes, are most
interesting monuments of the manners, habits, views, morality, practical
and dogmatical faith of the first centuries of the church; they are a most
unanswerable evidence that auricular confession, as a dogma, had then no
existence, and is quite a modern invention. Would it be possible that Jerome
had forgotten to give some advices or rules about auricular confession, to
the priests of his time who asked his council about the best way to fulfil
their ministerial duties, if it had been one of their duties to hear the
confessions of the people? But we challenge the most devoted modern priest
of Rome to find a single line in all the letters of St. Jerome in favor of
auricular confession. In his admirable letter to the Priest Nepotianus, on
the life of priests, vol. II., p. 203, when speaking of the relations, of
priests with women, he says: "Solus cum sola, secreto et absque arbitrio,
vel teste, non sedeas. Si familiarius est aliquid loquendum, habet nutricem.
majorem domus, virginem, viduam, vel mari tatam; non est tam inhumana ut
nullum praeter te habeat cui se audeat credere."

"Never sit in secret, alone,
in a retired place, with a female who is alone with you. If she has any particular
thing to tell
you, let her take the female attendant of the house, a young girl, a widow,
or a married woman. She cannot be so ignorant of the rules of human life
as to expect to have you as the only one to whom she can trust those things."

It would be easy to cite a great number of other
remarkable passages where Jerome showed himself the most determined and implacable
opponent of those secret tete-a-tete between a priest and a female,
which, under the plausible pretext of mutual advice and spiritual consolation,
are generally nothing but bottomless pits of infamy and perdition for both.
But this is enough.

We have also the admirable life of St. Paulina,
written by St. Jerome. And, though in it, he gives us every imaginable detail
of her life when young, married, and widow; though he tells us even how her
bed was composed of the simplest and rudest materials; he has not a word
about her ever having gone to confess. Jerome speaks of the acquaintances
of St. Paulina, and gives their names; he enters into the minutest details
of her long voyages, her charities, her foundations of monasteries for men
and women, her temptations, human frailties, heroic virtues, her macerations,
and her holy death; but he has not a word to say about the frequent or oracular
confessions of St. Paulina; not a word about her wisdom in the choice of
a prudent and holy (?) confessor.

He tells us that after her death, her body was
carried to her grave on the shoulders of bishops and priests, as a token
of their profound respect for the saint. But he never says that any of those
priests sat there, in a dark corner with her, and forced her to reveal to
their ears the secret history of all the thoughts, desires, and human frailties
of her long and eventful life. Jerome is an unimpeachable witness that his
saintly and noble friend, St. Paulina, lived and died without having ever
thought of going to confess.

Possidius has left us the interesting life of
St. Augustine, of the fifth century; and, again, it is in vain that we look
for the place and time when that celebrated Bishop of Hippo went to confess,
or heard the secret confessions of his people.

More than that, St. Augustine
has written a most admirable book called: "Confessions," in which he gives us the history of
his life. With that marvellous book in hand we follow him step by step, wherever
be goes; we attend with him those celebrated schools, where his faith and
morality were so sadly wrecked; he takes us with him into the garden where,
wavering between heaven and hell, bathed in tears, he goes under the fig-tree
and cries "Oh Lord! how long will I remain in my iniquities!" Our soul thrills
with emotions, with his soul, when we hear with him, the sweet and mysterious
voice: "Tolle! lege!" take and read. We run with him to the place where he
has left his gospel book; with a trembling hand, we open it and we read: "Let
us walk honestly as in the day... put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ. (Rom.
xiii. 13, 14.)

That incomparable book of St. Augustine makes
us weep and shout with joy with him; it initiates us into all his most secret
actions, to all his sorrows, anxieties, and joys; it reveals and unveils
his whole life. It tells us where he goes, with whom he sins, and with whom
he praises God; it makes us pray, sing, and bless the Lord with him. Is it
possible that Augustine could have been to confess without telling us when,
where, and to whom he made that auricular confession? Could he have received
the absolution and pardon of his sins from his confessor, without making
us partakers of his joys, and requesting us to bless that confessor with
him?

But it is in vain that
you look in that book for a single word about auricular confession. That
book is an unimpeachable witness
that both Augustine and his saintly mother, Monica, whom it mentions so often,
lived and died without ever having been to confess. That book may be called
the most crushing evidence to prove that "the dogma of auricular confession" is
a modern imposture.

From the beginning to the
end of that book, we see that Augustine believed and said that God alone
could forgive the sins
of men, and that it was to him alone that men had to confess in order to
be pardoned. If he writes his confession, it is only that the world might
know how God had been merciful to him, and that they might help him to praise
and bless his merciful heavenly father. In the tenth book of his Confessions,
Chapter III., Augustine protests against the idea that men could do anything
to cure the spiritual leper, or forgive the sins of their fellow-men; here
is his eloquent protest: "Quid mihi ergo est cum hominibus ut audiant confessiones,
meas, quasi ipsi sanaturi Sint languores meas? Curiosum genus ad cognescendam
vitam alienam; desidiosum ad corrigendam."

"What have I to do with
men that they should hear my confessions, as if they were able to heal my
infirmities? The human race
is very curious to know another person's life, but very lazy to correct it."

Before Augustine had built
up that sublime and imperishable monument against auricular confession, St.
John Chrysostom had
raised his eloquent voice against it in his homily on the 50th Psalm, where,
speaking in the name of the church, he said: "We do not request you to go
to confess your sins to any of your fellow-men, but only to God!

Nestorius, of the fourth
century, the predecessor of John Chrysostom, had, by a public defence, which
the best Roman Catholic
historians have had to acknowledge, solemnly forbidden the practice of auricular
confession. For, just as there has always been thieves, drunkards, and malefactors
in the world, so there has always been men and women who, under the pretext
of opening their minds to each other for mutual comfort and edification,
were giving themselves to every kind of iniquity and lust. The celebrated
Chrysostom was only giving the sanction of his authority to what his predecessor
had done, when, thundering against the newly-born monster, he said to the
Christians of his time, "We do not ask you to go and confess your iniquities
to a sinful man for pardon -- but only to God." (Homily on 50th Psalm.)

Auricular confession originated with the early
heretics, especially with Marcion. Bellarmin speaks of it as something to
be practiced. But let us hear what the contemporary writers have to say on
the question.

"Certain women were in
the habit of going to the heretic Marcion to confess their sins to him. But,
as he was smitten with
their beauty, and they loved him also, they abandoned themselves to sin with
him."

Listen now to what St. Basil in his commentary
on Ps. xxxvii, says of confession:

"I have not come before
the world to make a confession with my lips. But I close my eyes, and confess
my sins in the secret of my
heart. Before thee, O God, I pour out my sighs, and thou alone art the witness.
My groans are within my soul. There is no need of many words to confess:
sorrow and regret are the best confession. Yes, the lamentations of the soul,
which thou art pleased to hear, are the best confession."

In his homily V., De incomprehensibili
Dei natura, vol. I., he says: "Therefore, I beseech you, always confess your
sins to God! I, in no way, ask you to confess them to me. To God alone should
you
expose the wounds of your soul, and from him alone expect the cure. Go to
him, then, and you shall not be cast off, but healed. For, before you utter
a single word, God knows your prayer."

In his commentary on Heb.
XII., hom. XXXI., vol. XII., p. 289, he further says: "Let us not be content
with calling ourselves sinners. But let us examine and number our sins. And
then I do not tell you
to go and confess them, according to the caprice of some; but I will say
to you, with the prophet: 'Confess your sins before God, acknowledge your
iniquities at the feet of your Judge; pray in your heart and your mind, if
not with your tongue, and you shall be pardoned.'"

In his homily on. Ps. I.,
vol. V., p. 589, the same Chrysostom says: "Confess your sins every day in
prayer. Why should you hesitate to do so? I do not tell you to go and confess
to a man, sinner
as you are, and who might despise you if he knew your faults. But confess
them to God, who can forgive them to you."

In his admirable homily
IV., De Lazaro, vol. I., p. 757, he exclaims: "Why, tell me, should you be
ashamed to confess your sins? Do we compel you to reveal them to a man, who
might, one day, throw
them into your face? Are you commanded to confess them to one of your equals,
who could publish them and ruin you? What we ask of you is simply to show
the sores of your soul to your Lord and Master, who is also your friend,
your guardian, and physician."

In a small work of Chrysostom's,
entitled, "Catechesis
ad illuminandos," vol. II., p. 210, we read these remarkable words: "What
we should most admire is not that God forgives our sins, but that he does
not disclose them to anyone, nor wishes us to do so. What he demands of us
is to confess our transgressions to him alone to obtain pardon."

St. Augustine, in his beautiful
homily on the 31st Ps., says: "I shall confess my sins to God, and He will
pardon all my iniquities. And such confession is not made with the lips,
but with the heart
only. I had hardly opened my mouth to confess my sins when they were pardoned,
for God had already heard the voice of my heart."

In the edition of the Fathers
by Migne, vol. 67, pp. 614, 615, we read: "About the year 390, the office
of penitentiary was abolished in the church in consequence of a great scandal
given by a woman
who publicly accused herself of having committed a crime against chastity
with a deacon."

I know that the advocates
of auricular confession present to their silly dupes several passages of
the Holy Fathers, where
it is said that sinners were going to that priest or that bishop to confess
their sins: but this is a most dishonest way of presenting that fact -- for
it is evident to all those who are a little acquainted with the church history
of those times, that these referred only to the public confessions for public
transgressions through the office of the penitentiary.

The office of the penitentiary
was this: -- In every
large city, a priest or minister was specially appointed to preside over
the church meetings where the members who had committed public sins were
obliged to confess them publicly before the assembly, in order to be reinstated
in the privileges of their membership: and that minister had the charge of
reading or pronouncing the sentence of pardon granted by the church to the
guilty ones before they could be admitted again to communion. This was perfectly
in accordance with what St. Paul had done with regard to the incestuous one
of Corinth; that scandalous sinner who had cast obloquy on the Christian
name, but who, after confessing and weeping over his sins before the church,
obtained his pardon -- not from a priest in whose ears he had whispered all
the details of his incestuous intercourse, but from the whole church assembled.
St. Paul gladly approves the Church of Corinth in thus absolving, and receiving
again in their midst, a wandering but repenting brother.

When the Holy Fathers of
the first centuries speak of "confession" they invariably understand "public confessions" and
not auricular confession.

There is as much difference between such public
confessions and auricular confessions, as there is between heaven and hell,
between God and his great enemy, Satan.

Public confession, then, dates from the time of
the apostles, and is still practiced in Protestant churches of our day. But
auricular confession was unknown by the first disciples of Christ; as it
is rejected to-day, with horror, by all the true followers of the Son of
God.

Erasmus, one of the most
learned Roman Catholics who opposed the Reformation in the sixteenth century,
so admirably begun
by Luther and Calvin, fearlessly and honestly makes the following declaration
in his treatise, De Paenitentia, Dis. 5: "This institution of penance [auricular
confession] began rather of some tradition of the Old or New Testament But
our divines, not advisedly considering what the old doctors do say, are deceived,
that which they say of general and open confession, they wrest, by and by,
to this secret and privy kind of confession."

It is a public fact, which no learned Roman Catholic
has ever denied, that auricular confession became a dogma and obligatory
practice of the church only at the Council of Lateran in the year 1215, under
the Pope Innocent III. Not a single trace of auricular confession, as a dogma,
can be found before that year.

Thus, it has taken more than twelve hundred years
of efforts for Satan to bring out this masterpiece of his inventions to conquer
the world and destroy the souls of men.

Little by little, that imposture had crept into
the world, just as the shadows of a stormy night creep without anyone being
able to note the moment when the first rays of light gave way before the
dark clouds. We know very well when the sun was shining, we know when it
was very dark all over the world; but no one can tell positively when the
first rays of light faded away. So saith the Lord:

"The kingdom of Heaven
is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field.

"But while men slept, his
enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way.

"But when the blade was
sprung up, and brought forth fruit, there appeared the tares also.

"So the servants of the
householder came and said unto him: Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in
thy field? From whence then
hath it tares?

"He said unto them: An enemy hath done this." (Matt.
xiii. 24-28.)

Yes, the Good Master tells us that the enemy sowed
those tares in his field during the night when men were sleeping.

But he does not tell us precisely the hour of
the night when the enemy cast the tares among the wheat.

However, if anyone likes
to know how fearfully dark was the night which covered the "Kingdom," and
how cruel, implacable, and savage was the enemy who sowed the tares, let
him read the testimony
of the most devoted and learned cardinals whom Rome has ever had, Baronius,
Annals, Anno 900:

"It is evident that one
can scarcely believe what unworthy, base, execrable, and abominable things
the holy Apostolic See,
which is the pivot upon which the whole Catholic Church revolves, was forced
to endure, when princes of the age, though Christians, arrogated to themselves
the election of the Roman Pontiffs. Alas, the shame! alas, the grief! What
monsters, horrible to behold, were then intruded on the Holy See! What evils
ensued! What tragedies they perpetrated! With what pollutions was this See,
though itself without spot, then stained! With what corruptions infected! With
what filthiness defiled! And by these things blackened with perpetual infamy (Baronius,
Annals, Anno, 900.)